IT Beats The Exorcist as Biggest Horror Movie Ever

Andres Muschietti's big screen adaptation of IT terrified author Stephen King and is continuing to break records in the process, but the latest record is one to truly behold. IT is now on track to become the highest grossing domestic horror movie ever, beating long-standing classic The Exorcist. IT devoured its competition in its debut weekend, earning a record breaking $123 million dollars domestically, making it the highest grossing horror movie debut of all-time. Before IT came around, New Line dominated the genre, but it looks like Warner Bros. just took over that throne and in record time.

Anabelle: Creation just crossed over the $100 million mark, which is still considered a success, but IT will pass The Exorcist's $232.9 million-dollar lifetime domestic gross tomorrow in just over 2 weeks total time for the new movie. According to Deadline, Warner Bros. is calling it a record from a pure genre outlook with Jaws, The Sixth Sense, and I am Legend considered as horror movie hybrids. Jaws is considered to be action suspense, The Sixth Sense is drama suspense, and I am Legend is considered to be sci-fi/fantasy by Warner Bros.

Kingsman: The Golden Circle and Lego Ninjago Movie will likely take the top spots at the box office this coming weekend, but IT is still considered to rake in some serious cash over the next few weeks as Halloween approaches. IT is projected to have a $270 million-dollar domestic gross by the end of the week and will also take over as the largest movie to be released between the Labor Day and November timeframe. Gravity held that record at $274 million, but IT will soar past that next week.

A sequel to IT was already being whispered about before the first installment hit theaters, but now it's official and fans cannot wait for some more Pennywise. Pennywise actor Bill Skarsgard has revealed that there was a pretty disturbing scene that was cut from the new movie that showed off Pennywise's origins back in the 1600s and now it looks like we'll see that origin on the big screen when the sequel is released. While there's no official date set for IT 2, it is expected to come out in 2019 and take place 30 years after the events of the first movie. According to Andres Muschietti, the movie will show the kids as adults and use flashbacks to fill in the blanks from what was left out of the initial movie.

IT isn't just breaking records, the movie is doubling them. With the sequel on its way and the remake of Halloween on the way, we could be in the middle of a new golden age for horror movies that could possibly see the return of other featured characters that haven't gotten the proper reboot treatment yet. Regardless, it's going to be interesting to see just how far IT floats up at the box office by the end of October. At a time when the box office has been at a real low point, IT has gone on to be a dark red balloon of hope for the entire movie industry.